Below the Race Profiles section the individual race settings are listed. If race profiles are not being used these settings will default to the last settings used when the application was closed. If a race profile is not used the settings are stored in preferences.xml file otherwise they are stored in the database.
The Race Type selected changes how the race is tracked, by time or by number of laps. There are 4 race types currently supported.
For a timed race the race will end after the time limit has been reached. When the time limit is reached all racers must complete their final lap before the time out. When all racers have completed their final lap or timed out the race will end.
In a lap race the race will end after the first person reaches the lap limit. After the lap limit has been reached all other racer must complete their final lap before the time out. When all racers have completed their final lap or timed out the race will end.
With a lap and timed race the race will end after either the lap limit or the time limit is reached. When either the lap or time limit has been reached all remaining racers must complete their final lap before the time out. When all racers have completed their final lap or timed out the race will end.
A staggered race is similar to a timed race except each racer gets their own clock based on the time limit setting. Each individual racers clock will not start until after the first time they cross the lap counter. The race will end after the final racers time limit is reached and they have completed their final lap or timed out.
A Free Play race type is intended for open track time. It is not really a true race type, no results are stored. It has the following characteristics:
The race does not end automatically, no lap limit or time limit. You must manually end it by pressing the End Race Button on the Race Screen.
Results are not stored to the database after the session is ended.
Racers are removed from the race screen if they have not gotten a lap within the Time Out value on the Race Config Screen.
Racers can join the session at any time, the first time they cross the lap counter is considered their start time for calculating lap times.
Racers can rejoin a session after they have been timed out, all information has been reset for them including lap counts, times and best lap.
No rank or time announcements will be made.
Overall and personal best lap times will be announced.
On the Race Screen the pace column will show the average lap time.
Ranking on Race Screen is configurable.
This setting defines the lap limit for a Lap or Lap and Time based races. You can type values into the field or use the +/- buttons to increment and decrement the value by 1 lap.
For Timed, Lap and Timed and Staggered Time based races the Time Limit value defines how long the race will run. The value in this field is based on minutes. You can type values into the field or use the +/- buttons to increment and decrement the value by 1 minute.
The Minimum Lap Time defines the quickest lap time that will be accepted by the software. If a lap is less than this value it will not be recorded. You can enter a value into the field or use the +/- buttons to increment and decrement the value by 1 second.
The Round Type drop down defines whether this race is a Practice, Heat, Qualifier or Main. This information is used for the summary of the race, the race auto naming field and will show up in the race report.
When a race is started the count down timer will begin. The Count Down Time defines how long the count down before a race will be. If audio is enabled the software will start to announce count down seconds remaining at 5 seconds. If the Count Down Time is set to 8 seconds or longer the software will announce "Prepare to Race" and then count down.
At the specified number of seconds the program will count down the time remaining. For example if set to 5 seconds when only 5 seconds are left the program will count down 5, 4, 3, 2, 1 and the race will end. If this is set to 0 it will not count down.
When the race time or lap limits have been reached the time out value will be used to end the race for racers that have not completed their final lap. If it takes the racer longer than the time out value to finish the final lap their race will be ended.
Select the style of count down to use for the races. A traditional count down will display the count down time on the screen and when the count down reaches 5 seconds it will start saying the seconds remaining in the count down. When the countdown reaches 0 the starting horn sound will play and the race starts. In an F1 style count down instead of displaying the seconds in the count down the program will beep the specified number of times set as the starting count down number. When it reaches the final beep the program will set a random delay between 1 and 10 seconds before playing the starting horn and starting the race.
This setting defines whether or not the ending horn sound effect plays when a race is complete. The sound effect will be triggered in a timed race when the time limit is reached. In a lap race it will be triggered when the first person reaches the lap limit.
By default when a lap is detected the software will beep but there are other interesting options available.
The default lap indication setting is the beep, this will play a beep sounding wav file.
The Lap Indication can be changed to announce the Lap Time using this setting. Each time a new lap is detected the software will say the time. For example is a racer just got a lap time of 7.8 seconds then the software will announce 7.8 seconds.
The Lap Different Lap Indication will announce the different between a racers best lap time and their current lap time. If it is a new best lap for that racer the software will announce the new best lap, otherwise it will just be the difference in time between their current time and their best lap time. For example if a racer has a best lap of 7.6 seconds and they just got a new lap of 7.8 seconds the software will announce .2 seconds.
If the Enable Rank Announcements setting is enabled then periodically during a race the current ranks of each racer will be announced. Set the Rank Announcement Interval to define when the announcements occur. You can also hit the "r" key at any time and the software will announce the current ranks.
The Rank Announcement Interval defines how often the current ranks of each racer will be announced if the Enable Rank Announcements feature is enabled. This value sets the number of minutes between rank announcements. You can also hit the "r" key at any time and the software will announce the current ranks.
The Rank Method option allows you to change how racers are ranked during a race.
This ranking method ranks by the total laps followed by the time they were completed in.
This ranking method ranks by the best lap times. This is useful for qualifying rounds.
This setting configures the speech settings for announcing rank changes during a race. If it is set to Lead Change then the program will only announce when someone takes the lead. If it is set to Any Change then the program will announce a rank change any time someone moves up in rank.
This option allows you to change when best laps are announced. You can choose between none, personal or overall. When set to personal each races individual best lap time will be announced when it occurs during the race. If set to overall individual racers best lap times will not be announced, only the best lap overall will be announced during the race.